Ohioans pulled to state's cable wakeboarding parks

Thursday

Jun 21, 2012 at 12:01 AMJun 21, 2012 at 1:49 PM

MARYSVILLE, Ohio - For an avid wakeboarder, Nicole Stanley has little need for a key piece of equipment: a boat. She hasn't ridden behind one in two years, preferring instead to be pulled across the lake and over ramps and rails by electric cables 30 feet overhead.

Amy Saunders, The Columbus Dispatch

MARYSVILLE, Ohio - For an avid wakeboarder, Nicole Stanley has little need for a key piece of equipment: a boat. She hasn't ridden behind one in two years, preferring instead to be pulled across the lake and over ramps and rails by electric cables 30 feet overhead.

On a weekly basis, she and her husband, Kele, visit one of two cable wakeboarding parks in Ohio: Wake Nation outside Cincinnati and Wakeopolis, which opened last month in Marysville.

The Springfield couple, both 29, even spent part of their honeymoon driving to four parks in Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas.

"Cable parks are where it's at now," Kele Stanley said during a recent visit to Wakeopolis.

"Low power consumption, infinite pull, obstacles in the water - who needs a boat?"

Wakeopolis owner Tyler Dunham also sees the sport moving increasingly toward facilities such as his park, which features a 4-acre, man-made lake between a field and the traffic on Rt. 33.

Cable parks are popular overseas, with leading manufacturer Rixen Cableways of Germany having built 200 systems in 40 countries since 1966. But the idea is newer in the United States, whose dozen parks have opened predominantly in the past several years.

On a recent evening at Wakeopolis, reggae and rock music blared from a small shack where employees manned the controls of the cable, which runs between two towers positioned at opposite ends of the lake.

The Stanleys took turns riding back and forth on the cable, reaching speeds of about 18 mph as they practiced tricks and jumps off three obstacles anchored in the lake.

"You were in orbit, man!" Dunham shouted as Kele Stanley landed a huge jump off a 3 1/2-foot ramp.

A mechanical engineer, patent lawyer and longtime wakeboarder, Dunham saw opportunity in cable systems after visiting Wake Nation in 2009 when it opened in Fairfield.

He has since worked on opening his facility, buying the cable equipment for $32,000 and modifying the lake, which had been dug for a nearby highway overpass.

Given the prohibitive costs of owning and maintaining a boat, Dunham hopes that cable parks can introduce more people to wakeboarding - including the thousands of snowboarders and skateboarders he sees as potential customers.

"If you look at the people who wakeboard, which is very similar, it's a fraction of that," said Dunham, 32, an associate lawyer at Standley Law Group in Dublin. "The real reason is that people don't have access to a boat."

Picking up wakeboarding at a park, he said, can be less intimidating than trying it behind a boat. The overhead cable helps beginners stay on their feet; operators immediately stop the cable when they fall.

An annual membership to Wakeopolis, which costs $50 through July 4, provides the opportunity to reserve the lake in one-hour increments ($70 on weekdays and $110 on weekends and holidays.)

The park also offers open sessions three days a week, during which nonmembers can ride the cable, receive instruction and borrow equipment for $14.

Tyler Wiant is the type of member Dunham had in mind: A snowboarder, Wiant has long been interested in trying his skills on the water but hasn't been on a boat in a decade.

"I'm not looking to do anything other than have fun - but, for me, fun is kind of pushing the limit," said Wiant, 27, of Marysville.

"I would have never had the opportunity to enjoy this if not for a place like this."

Even people with access to boats see benefits to cable parks: Instead of waiting for a turn on friends' boats, the Stanleys visit parks on their own schedule and spend downtime barbecuing onshore.

Wakeopolis employee Nate Stettler enjoys boating with friends but sometimes prefers the calmer waters of the cable park to Griggs Reservoir, where high traffic can result in choppy water unsuitable for tricks.

"If there's a bunch of boats out on a busy weekend, sometimes you don't even want to bother," said Stettler, 21, a junior at Ohio State University.

Wakeopolis has 22 members, a modest number Dunham attributes to lack of awareness about the park and the sport. But he is encouraged, he said, by the success of the American cable parks that preceded his.

"As we've gone through the recession, . . . every single one that has opened is still in business. To me, that's a pretty good business model."

In Fairfield, Wake Nation has been so successful that operators last year opened a second park in Houston. The park, which includes two lakes, has become a regional destination for wakeboarders, co-owner Nick Binkley said.

For Kele and Nicole Stan-ley, the parks offer endless entertainment as they try to learn new tricks.

"The challenge is what I dig," Kele Stanley said. "It's a progression that kind of never ends."

asaunders@dispatch.com

@amyksaunders

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